[lit-ideas] Re: A Diversion for Julie (and anyone else in need)
- From: David Ritchie <ritchierd@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 12 Apr 2005 09:05:48 -0700
Quite the weekend for food as entertainment. On Saturday evening, with
Julia on a plane to Germany, Emily invited chums to watch movies in our
living room. We went out to eat with Laura's cousins. Laura and I choose
restaurants differently. She is always in search of something new; I go
through my mental file of places that can be trusted and suggest one. On
this occasion in the run-up to going out, I was busy with Sunday's poem, so
I called upstairs--they were having a phone debate--that I'd go along with
any decision they made. I found, when Eve and Mike arrived, that nothing
had yet been decided; no need to close out possibilities too quickly. I
have little patience with this kind of thing, in such decisions preferring a
quick consensus over exploring all options. (Not so when it comes to buying
cars or boats or swords or books). They had the "Entertainment" book out
and were looking into coupons. Eventually they agreed to drive by the
restaurant with the disconnected phone--to see if it really was closed--and
then to try...
We were seated in one restaurant for a few minutes before I--mea culpa--said
that we ought to leave. It was a matter of simple math: number of waiting
tables full of hungry people divided by the number of waitpersons working.
The restaurant had only been open a week and they were clearly having
break-in trouble. At the next restaurant there was a forty minute wait and
both Mike and I were too hungry for this. The women, who had snacked before
going out, were not.
We found the third restaurant via a coupon in the newspaper and something
that a friend had said to me a couple of weeks ago when we were out looking
at boats. It's a chinese place that has changed owners. He said he'd heard
from his chinese-American friends that the food was good. As we walked in
the door we saw that we were nearly the only non-Chinese in the place. The
food was coming out quickly, coming out hot, coming out looking attractive.
We sat. The waitress gave us menus and asked us right away if we were ready
to order. I'll say she had an engaging command of English and try to
explain. We said we needed a moment. When she came back and took our order
there was a pause, and then she said, "I read it back." Now it could be
that she was just being careful, but somehow everyone at the table got the
impression that "I read it back," meant, "You gotta be kidding me."
"One hot and sour soup, one crab soup..."
"That was a seafood soup."
"Crab soup is better."
"We'll have the crab soup."
"One crab soup, one duck dumpling, one General Tso, one Sze Chuan chicken,
one steam rice. You no want vegetable?"
"What do you have."
"Snow pea leaves."
"How are they prepared?"
"In garlic."
"That sounds good."
"You want snow pea leaves?"
"Yes, please. Snow pea leaves."
"One snow pea leaves. That everything?"
"Yes."
"O.K., I read it back...One hot and sour soup, one crab soup, one duck
dumpling--jus one, right?"
"We're trying things."
"One order duck dumpling, one General Tso, one Sze Chuan chicken, one steam
rice, one snow pea leaves."
"Thank you."
"I bring you water."
She left. She returned.
"No more duck dumpling. We have pork."
"We'll have pork."
"O.K., I read it back. One crab soup, one hot and sour soup--what size soup
you want?"
"What size do they come in?"
"Medium and...medium is good."
"How big is a medium? How many people does it serve?"
"Two to four people."
"And we have two soups coming. Is there a small?"
"Crab soup come small. Not hot and sour."
"We'll have one small crab soup and one medium hot and sour."
"O.K.... I read it back. One medium hot and sour soup, one small crab soup,
one pork dumpling, one General Tso, one Sze Chuan chicken, one steam rice,
one snow pea leaves."
And she looked at us, very carefully. "I bring you water."
It came. There was enough soup for a party of ten. Sze Chuan chicken was
clearly not a dish that interested the cook. But the rest of the food was
very good. Eventually someone else brought us water.
On Sunday I woke with the idea that I was going to return to fish with
bananas. I cooked this once when on holiday in Hawaii and those were the
only fresh-looking ingredients available. On Sunday morning it occurred to
me that, with Julia away there was no reason that I couldn't add a mild and
creamy curry sauce to this combination. Ed and Jo are adventurous eaters.
Why not? So I modified a recipe in "How's and Why's of French Cooking," and
then went in search of a suitable wine.
Our local store has a female wine steward, a very nice and helpful person.
When she came over, I couldn't resist having a bit of fun.
"Yes," I said. "I'm puzzling over a little bit of a problem and I'd welcome
your advice. I'm making fish with bananas and wonder if you can suggest a
good wine to go with this dish?"
Give her full credit, she began, "That sounds delicious..."
I added the complication, "I'm making a mild, cream-based curry sauce to go
with it, so there's the problem of the fat in the cream and the spices in
the curry."
We went where I imagined we would go--towards dry gewurztraminers--and then
I added the third complication. The people coming to dinner have this sense
that the first duty of white wine is to be bone dry. She steered me towards
a bottle by a company called CNW, short for "Chard No Way." They make very
dry Chenin Blanc. The clincher was the back-of-bottle copy, which I quote
here exactly as it appears, "It is our belife that Chenin Blanc (when made
well) rivals some of the greatest white wines of the world. This wine was
made from cool climate grapes, barrel fermented in French Oak, and aged for
6 months. Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah... REDISCOVER CHENIN BLANC."
It was perfect.
David Ritchie
Portland, Oregon.
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